Sacramento’s employment picture has taken another hit. Campbell's announced today it will completely shut down its Sacramento plant by July.

The company told its 700 employees their jobs will not transfer
to other manufacturing sites. Anthony Sanzio with Campbell's
says the canned-soup plant is no longer needed,"We've had volume
declines in U.S. canned soup and the company is focused on new
packaging formats beyond the can -so, pouches, tubs, and other
things."

Sanzio says sales have been flat in the past year.

Employees were stunned by the news. Retiree Jesse Escobar
worked for Campbell's for 36 years. He says he thought the plant
might be in trouble, "This friend of mine that's currently employed
here -he told me that this past August 1st that Campbell's
Soup wasn't going to produce or manufacture chicken noodle. Right
there I had a gut feeling. I said, 'Uh oh, that's bad."

It was the second piece of bad employment news in as many days
for Sacramento. Comcast announced Wednesday it was moving 300 jobs
out of Natomas and 1000 jobs out of California.

California Senate President Darrell Steinberg reacted to the
second day of bad job news for Sacramento by defending the state's
record of job creation. He says they loss of 1,000 jobs runs
contrary to the past year in which the Sacramento Region has added
16,000 jobs, "Campbell's and Comcast are two examples that
have nothing to do with the so-called regulatory environment or how
California and its government interacts with business. I think
these were independent decisions. They've said that. The
evidence is very clear the call centers are happily locating and
expanding in California."

But, when asked if California is a more difficult place to
do business than in the rest of the United States, Comcast's Sanzio
said, "What I can tell you is that our cost to produce
products in California at a plant here in California are more than
at a plant in Paris, Texas. So, you know, I think we'll leave it at
that."

Steinberg's office says 300,000 jobs were created in California
in the last twelve months, which is twice the rate of job growth in
the rest of country.